Saturday, September 25, 2010

This week has been crazy, so I'm just going to keep this short or I'll start another rant about it.

I have planned the kit for Hermione, or most of it anyway, now I just need to select yarns and start working on it. Everything else will have to wait until next week, which will hopefully be better than this one.

Saturday, August 14, 2010

That's the sight greeting me when I opened the package, lots of lovely, handknit flowers and leaves plus some paper leaves. The smaller flowers are brooches, the black one (hidden under a leave on the pic) is already on the lapel of my purple jacket.

Below, I found a folder with a timetable for our summer camp, plus patterns for the handmade items, instructions for camp crafts etc. All the little packages inside had times on them and held items needed for the activities at that time. That was a really nice idea and gave me some insight into what a summer camp could be like. I've never been to one.

That's everything unwrapped, I'll try to list it all here: handknit sunflowers, leaves, flower brooches, a flower necklace (red flower with dark green on the pic), a crochet wrist band, 3 wooden dinos for my little house elf Philipp, Creole seasoning mix, Graham crackers and marshmallows (to make smores), stitch markers and a knitting magazine. And of course yarn and beads and pattern to make the Lady of the Wood fingerless mittens by Ann Kingston. The yarn is KnitPicks Shimmer, an alpaca silk blend, I can't wait to knit with it. And the colour is perfect for me.

Here is a slightly blurry close up of the stitch markers, cute little leaves and flowers.

Thank you so much Poppy for this beautiful kit, I love every single item in it. And Philipp loves the dinos, he had them all assembled within 5 minutes and hasn't stopped playing with them since.

Now I'm off to fondle the yarn and look through the patterns, please excuse me.

Sunday, August 8, 2010

I have been on another trip to the UK, mainly to Cardiff via London and Bristol. I met with a friend in London on Wednesday, as my flight was going there anyway. The next day I took a coach to Bristol, where I met up with two friends of mine. We went to Bradford on Avon for lunch - or rather a cream tea for myself, as we were in a tea room called "The Bridge". I just couldn't resist the scones and clotted cream. The night was spent at my friends place in Bristol, we watched the first episode of "Sherlock", chatted and knit, it was really nice.

The next morning we took the train to Cardiff, where we saw a lot of Torchwood and Doctor Who filming locations. We even went to the National History Museum, which we should see on Sunday night in the second episode of "Sherlock" - where it was supposed to be a museum in London. Didn't know London was that close to Cardiff ;-)

Of course I couldn't be in Cardiff without visiting the Doctor Who exhibition, they had a few really nice things on display. I love how real this shot of the Ood turned out:

On Saturday night, we went to a concert at "The Globe" and got to see Spiridion (a Welsh metal band I really enjoyed) and Blue Gillespie (the band of Gareth David Lloyd, who played Ianto in Torchwood). It was a fun evening, even if the location was way too hot.

Unfortunately my vacation was over all too soon, I came back home on Monday - which I basically spent in buses, waiting for buses, waiting on the airport and on an airplane.

Cardiff is really a nice city, I definitely want to go again sometime - and to Bristol, London, Edinburgh and so many other regions in the UK I haven't visited yet.